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Much of the pre-conference chatter was that CES was an event in decline, but many events have proved very popularEthan Miller

Murad AhmedTechnology Reporter in Las Vegas

Last updated at 6:26AM, January 10 2012

— Live demonstrations can be tricky. Derek Schneider, a Microsoft executive,
was on stage showing off the company’s new Windows Phone software. He wanted
to show how the phone can understand spoken words and convert them into
text. “Sound’s great,” he said into the phone.

Then, he continued to read from his script, saying “And the words will turn up
just like that.” Only they didn’t. The text, which could be seen on big
screens by the audience of thousands, simply read: “Sound”. Whoops.

— Samsung wants to create new devices that are “smart”. In technology circles,
this usually just means “put